La dulce fa niente

Hello there.  It's strange to clack my thoughts out on this little word processing device.  I haven't done much in the way of self-expression today, unless you count intentionally mixing horrendous patterns in my outfits to cause the blood pressure of every Italian woman in a five-kilometer radius to rise just a little bit.  Palm Sunday, according to the Catholics.  A day during which all of Rome is closed, and there are barbeques, and parties, and assorted fun things.  My Italian is pretty amazing.  Probably too good to waste on actual Italian people, who aren't ready for the things I could do to their language.

Nothing particularly interesting happened today.  Gill and I went to breakfast, ate, and went back to the room.  I got to finishing Preacher by Garth Ennis (a graphic novel I took from a friend's portable hard drive).  All sixty-something books of it are officially read.  We lazed around all day eating oranges and soaking up sunlight and the unwary breezes that found their way into our room via the open window.  I took a shower, and almost killed myself in the cubicle intended for this purpose, first by scalding myself within an inch of life, and then by cutting myself shaving once or twice because the shower isn't large enough, or equipped with enough foot-holds, to make this endeavor anything resembling easy.

Gill and I took a walk at around four thirty because the day was pretty outside, and there was nothing to do in the hotel room.  On our way out, we encountered some women with hiking poles and boots and large floppy hats.  They were walking in the direction of the church in our town.  I personally think it's relatively famous in this area for being scenic and quaint.  At least, judging by the sheer mass of people that swarmed it today, I would believe that it holds some sort of significance for the local population.  The walk took us halfway down a hill near the road that leads up the hill to our town, the exploration of which yielded an irate puppy dog in a large cage carved into the rock, a large pile of rocks and trees and rubble that smelled suspiciously of dead things, and a little creek that reeked overwhelmingly of sewage.  In the other direction, we found large trees, pretty vines creepy-crawling their way up long-dead trees, some ambient sounds of Italian folks enjoying themselves with barbecue, a gray tabby cat with a loud Meowl!, and a local cemetery, closed for the day, which expressly forbids visits in excess of thirty minutes per grave.  And they said you can't put a time limit on grief!

We returned to the hotel room the more ambient sounds of Italians enjoying themselves, and got back to our pursuits.  I to my reading, Gill to her tumbler-ing, and e-mail writing, and music-listening.  We had a good ten or fifteen minutes in which we listened to just Taylor Swift songs, because of a hilarious encounter with a guy on the train the other day.

We were heading back from Rome, tired and extremely sore.  The train was fairly crowded, so we sat down next to a harmless-looking Italian fellow in circular glasses.  I expressed how happy I was to be back in the warm, because it was a very cold day outside, and he looked at me strangely.  Then, as we settled into our seats, I became aware of the fact that he'd applied his headphones, and was now listening to some sort of music on full blast.  Not one to deny others the privilege and untainted joy of auditory degeneration, I contented myself with eavesdropping, and quickly realized that there was something wrong with the music he was listening to.  I'd accustomed myself to listening for undifferentiated techno of poor and mass-produced quality, but this was something different.  The singer didn't sound Italian...and then it hit me like a thunderbolt in the uterus!  This boy was bopping to You Belong With Me by Taylor Swift!  I made Gill aware of this fact, and we listened bemusedly as this guy flipped through other songs to get back to more Taylor Swift.  He also had time to play Love Story and another song, which I can't remember because those are the only two songs I know by Taylor Swift.  I was crying and turning the color of a radish because of suppressed laughter.  He finally got off the train, and I exploded into hysterical giggles, to the quiet amusement of our fellows in the area. 

After listening to Taylor Swift today, we derped around for a while, wrote some more couchsurfing requests, and finally threw in the towel with going to Scotland.  It just wasn't meant to be!  No hostels are available for Good Friday, and the only hotels that will take us cost ridiculous amounts of money.  So I'll deal with being in London for an extra four days or so, and then head home to Colorado.  It's a little exciting, because I miss the elevation, and the clean water.  Oh, and the people.  ;-)

We changed my ticket to arrive in Denver on the 22nd, and I expect to be back in the swing of things in the middle of the weekend, or at the very latest, Sunday.  That'll be Catholic Easter, which was a bitch to plan around in all of the Southern European countries.  At least I can safely ignore it from my den in Colorado, drinking lots of coffee and scribbling away to my heart's content.  Who knows?  Maybe I'll even plan a mini-roadtrip somewhere interesting with the remainder of my funds from the European Vacation. 

And that's how I spent my Palm Sunday!  I need to pack now, since tomorrow is the day we leave the hotel for the airport, and the magic of Londontowne once again.  I probably won't get around to it until tomorrow, though, because I'm unspeakably lazy, and perhaps taking the spirit of this day of complete rest slightly too seriously.  Also, I'm interested in reading my new book.  Ciao!